Consider that Local Motors themselves said the cars are not street legal.

I had not considered the 'we're disruptive so laws don't apply to us' aspect. Assuming they want to operate as a legitimate company and not have a bunch of dead customers, I am sure even you could find some laws in here that would make a 'design it yourself' car made out of printed plastic just a bit of a problem, especially in the 'crashworthiness' section.

44 HOURS per machine. Almost 80000 times as long as stamping.

My point was that all of the common parts (ie the ones that you can actually make money selling) are already available from third parties. No auto manufacturer is getting rich selling climate control sliders or even climate control heads. Yes, those parts may be expensive to buy, but that does not mean they are some sort of cash cow for the manufacturer like the OP seems to think. I suspect that the manufacturers wouldn't carry those parts at all if they could avoid it, because they are money losers.

The math may be easy, but you didn't do any. The OP said 'competitive'. That means efficiency, or more simply, cost. What is the COST of each of those printers, the energy to run them, the manpower, the space, etc? How does that COST compare to a simple metal-stamping plant, producing the same number of items?

For very low production runs, the printer will probably be cheaper. For anything remotely mass-produced the traditional plant will be orders of magnitude cheaper.

You don't really think that the dealer is the only place to buy replacement parts, do you?

The hundreds of dollars is usually mostly made up of the cost of making it look good - sanding, painting, etc. Unless these cars are going to be just raw material, with no finish (not even UV protection), they will have the same issues. And if they are going to be just raw materials with no finish, yuck.

How many parts do you suppose an average AutoZone sells in a day? Now, imagine that instead of having those parts stocked (either in the store or within a day), they have all the materials, space, and tooling to MANUFACTURE those parts. How much manufacturing space do they need in order to meet the same turn-around time as today? How much is all that space, materials, and time going to cost? You are just plain crazy if you think that model will EVER be more effective than high-speed manufacturing using stamping, injection molding, and vacuum forming.

Do you really think you stopped getting tools made at your local blacksmith because they were MORE efficient than factories?

Why would they need a new rule? I am pretty sure the existing ones will do just fine.

I was wondering how long it would be before some idiot started complaining about regulatory capture. Certainly didn't take long.

Yeah, I'll bet the auto manufacturers are really losing sleep over this 'disruption'. Gee, they can print out a body in only 44 hours - what's it take a real manufacturer, 2 seconds? And how does a car that 'anybody' can design even begin to meet safety standards? Or are safety standards just another 'regulatory capture'?

By law (at least in many states in the US), they do. You did know that, right?

What does the last line of that article say? I'll copy it here for you: THE BILL DID NOT BECOME LAW. So where is the citation that there was ever a law. For that matter, where is the citation that the legislature actually made such a bill? And no, wikipedia does not count.

In NY, bicycles by law must have a bell and it must be used.

Well at least you will have the comfort of knowing, with your dying breath, that it was the other guys responsibility.

How do you explain the studies done by the NHTSA that show hybrids and electrics, at speeds under 35MPH, are 37% more likely to hit walkers and 66% more likely to hit cyclists than ICE cars?

Uh, no. You can't provide a citation of something that never was. You can, however, provide a citation to something that supposedly exists. So, where exactly is the citation for this 'law'? Let me guess: wikipedia. Oops, even that (again providing no citations) specifically says it never became law.